The September 2014 NOAA map of temperature departure from average. You can see a large pocket of much colder than average weather over the USA’s East Coast, Midwest and South, giving skeptics some easy-to-use but inaccurate evidence that Global Climate change is a farce.

NOAA produces maps of the planet comparing the temperature and precipitation in any given month to historic trends. Included with these maps is a wealth of information comparing recent climatic events to historic trends. In September, the global average temperature was the highest ever recorded in the month, with the first nine months of the year equaling the hottest on record, tied with 1998. You can read more about the monthly temperature and precipitation trends here.

Winter is here so my mind was on wintery searches this month, such as, “GIS and glaciers.” This search string will lead you to a paper on GIS and glacial erosion patterns by Principato and Johnson of Gettysburg College. By combining field studies with GIS analysis, the authors are able to make some well-supported claims on the glaciated regions of Iceland.